The Chain
consists of four movements. The first and the third – slow and calm – are
played ad libitum, while the second and fourth are more vivacious and are played in a traditional
manner, a battuta. The exception is the climax of the finale and of the
entire composition, which is treated as an ad libitum section.

In each
movement the solo part and the orchestral part comprise a series of overlapping
episodes in accordance with the “chain principle”: the solo violin parts begin
and end when successive “lines” of the orchestra have already begun, thus the
boundaries of both are shifted. Each of such episodes has a distinctive sonic
profile, determined by the choice of pitches, rhythms and colours, and the
kaleidoscopic changeability of musical ideas is truly amazing. Particularly
beautiful in its sound materials is a fragment of the second movement with a
lyrical melody played by the solo violin against a background of “sliding”
sounds of the string section, “underscored” by vibraphone and glockenspiel.
There is also an interesting allusion to Szymanowski’s music, introduced
shortly after the beginning of the first movement – we hear the “flageolet Pan
horn” from Myths for violin and piano, op. 30. That same melody –
played, as in the original, with a characteristic “glassy” sound – also appears
in the finale of Lutosławski’s Partita.

The premiere of Chain began
a collaboration between Lutosławski and the eminent German violinist
Anne-Sophie Mutter. Impressed by her skill, the composer arranged his Partita
for violin and ensemble, and in the last few months of his life he began
writing a Violin Concerto, which, however, he did not manage to finish.
With Mutter in mind, Lutosławski also allowed the Chain to be performed
together with the Partita and composed an orchestral Interlude,
separating the two pieces in the case of a joint presentation, thus giving the
soloist a breather.